<\/p>\n
Nicknamed the \u201cair-raid siren,\u201d Bruce Dickinson has one of the most powerful voices in the history of Heavy Metal. When he joined Iron Maiden<\/a> in the early 80s, he elevated the band to a new level of success and expanded their songwriting possibilities, becoming a fundamental part of their rise to prominence as one of the biggest bands in the world.<\/p>\n He remains a major influence on Metal artists worldwide and over the years many renowned singers who preceded him have shared their opinions about his work, including the late Ronnie James Dio.<\/p>\n What was Ronnie James Dio\u2019s opinion on Bruce Dickinson and Iron Maiden<\/p>\n Ronnie James Dio was a big fan of Iron Maiden and admired Bruce Dickinson as a singer, considering him one of the greatest singers in the world. \u201cThere are so many types of vocalist these days. I think Chris Cornell from Audioslave is a great singer , really excellent, I really love his voice, I think he\u2019s top notch. Bruce Dickinson is a really good singer as well, you know. I\u2019m sure there are others out there but those are some of the people,\u201d Dio told Alternative Zine<\/a> in 2005 when asked who was the best vocalist in the world back then.<\/p>\n The legendary singer had a lot of respect for Iron Maiden and said that they were one of the bands that made him proud to say he was a Heavy Metal musician. He mentioned them when explaining why he was bothered by new artists who were not dedicated to their music.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat I don\u2019t like about (Heavy Metal), I sometimes don\u2019t like how easy it seems for musicians to say \u2018I\u2019m gonna be a Heavy Metal musician\u2019 and not do it well. I think that bothers me the most. That it seems such an easy route to go because the Marshalls gonna be turned up to 10 and what goes out of it is normally a rhythm first, anyway and then an attitude.\u201d<\/p>\n Ronnie continued:<\/p>\n \u201cBut you know, what happened to the guitar players? What happened to the singers? I found that it has become too easy (for people) to just go out and flail away your instrument and screech away at your voice or mumble away. That bothers me, because I came from a place where my peers, guys from Zeppelin<\/a>, Deep Purple and then later on from Judas Priest and Iron Maiden. All people that I respect, who can sing, play and think. (People who) have a good social conscience or people that make me proud to do this,\u201d Ronnie James Dio told Sam Dunn<\/a> in 2004 (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage).<\/p>\n Dio can be seen hanging out backstage at Iron Maiden\u2019s show at the Forum in Los Angeles in their famous documentary \u201cFlight 666<\/a>\u201d (2009).<\/p>\n Dio was Iron Maiden\u2019s opening act during the Bruce Dickinson and Blaze Bayley eras<\/p>\n Ronnie was a good friend of Maiden and he had the chance to be the band\u2019s opening act multiple times. In 1998 he was the band\u2019s opening act when was promoting the live album \u201cInferno: Last In Live\u201d and Maiden had just released \u201cVirtual XI\u201d, their second and final album with Blaze Bayley.<\/p>\n Bayley recalled the experience of touring with Dio, saying: \u201cThe toughest part (touring that era) was when Ronnie James Dio was supporting Iron Maiden. I\u2019m the lead singer of Iron Maiden, and Ronnie James Dio<\/a> is literally God of heavy-metal singing. I\u2019ve loved him. He\u2019s my inspiration to be a heavy-metal singer.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve got everything he\u2019s done on vinyl. I\u2019ve seen him in concert four or five times, and he\u2019s supporting me? God is supporting me? Ahh!! I watched him every night on the tour. I would be in the back with fans watching Ronnie with the fans. Then I\u2019d run back and get ready for our set. It was fantastic,\u201d he told Rolling Stone<\/a> in 2022.<\/p>\n In 2000, in a show in Belgium, Dio received Bruce and Nicko on stage to play \u201cRainbow in the Dark\u201d. Then in 2003, Dio alongside Mot\u00f6rhead were Iron Maiden\u2019s opening act during a tour in the United States and Canada.<\/p>\n During the conversation with Alternative Zine in 2005, Dio explained that a Heavy Metal band mascot should have a silly name just like Eddie from Iron Maiden. \u201c(I named mine Murray) because it sounded silly. I think something that is supposed to be so evil and so dark deserves a silly name, just like Eddie from Iron Maiden,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Dio, Bruce Dickinson and RobHalford considered forming a supergroup<\/p>\n Curiously, Bruce and Dio almost were in a band together. They considered creating the project The Three Tremors with Judas Priest\u2019s Rob Halford. They wanted it to be a Metal version of the Three Tenors, which was an operatic singing trio formed by Luciano Pavarotti, Pl\u00e1cido Domingos and Jos\u00e9 Carreras.<\/p>\n Ronnie has always been one of Bruce\u2019s favorite singers ever since he first heard his voice on the radio when Rainbow<\/a> was being played. He recalled the idea for that project, saying:\u00a0 \u201cWe were gonna do this thing with three metal singers. Myself, Ronnie James Dio and Rob Halford. However, for reasons that (didn\u2019t make much sense). (It was) managerial bullshit or whatever. There was some opposition, not from me, to having Ronnie there, which I thought was crazy. So the suggestion was that we would have Geoff Tate instead. So Roy (Z) and I wrote a tune. We thought we\u2019d have a go at writing an album that would be sung by three singers.\u201d<\/p>\n Bruce Dickinson continued:<\/p>\n \u201cWe only got as far as one song, and that song was \u2018Tyranny Of Souls\u2019. And the idea was that had we done the project, the chorus would have been all three singers (singing together). But the beginning of it would have been kind of one line me. Then one line Geoff, one line Rob, and so on, through the song. Each line would have been written so it would suit the delivery. It would suit the vocal characteristic of whoever was singing it.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSo it was quite a tall order. It (would have been) quite difficult to do. I thought, \u2018Shit, it\u2019s gonna be pretty difficult to do a whole album of this stuff\u2019 and, of course, we never did. But \u2018Tyranny Of Souls\u2019, the demo of it was designed to illustrate how that would have worked,\u201d he said during his spoken-word<\/a> tour in 2022.<\/p>\n Bruce\u2019s favorite Ronnie James Dio song<\/p>\n Although Bruce loved Dio\u2019s work in Rainbow, Black Sabbath and solo, his favorite stuff was from a side project. An album called \u201cButterfly Ball and the Grasshopper\u2019s Feast\u201d (1974), which was produced by Roger Glover. \u201cOne of my favorite tenors is Ronnie [James] Dio. Ronnie was kind of a hybrid. As he got older his voice was much more robust. But if you hear him on some early stuff, in particular some of the stuff he did pre-Rainbow\u2026 There was an album he did called Butterfly Ball.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHe was a guest on it and Roger Glover from Deep Purple wrote a lot of it and produced it. There\u2019s a song on there called \u2018Love Is All\u2019 and his voice is like glass. It\u2019s so transparent and it\u2019s just amazing. I\u2019ve always wanted to cover that song. Not necessarily on an album, but live,\u201d Bruce Dickinson said in an interview with Loudwire<\/a> in 2021.<\/p>\n